Just another Clato fanfic
by IzzyFallsTooFast
Summary: What happens when Clove wins the Games and meets Cato afterward?


**Hey guys this is my first Fanfic, so don't judge too harshly. ;P Constructive criticism is appreciated, as are tips and suggestions. :) Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games**

It's been about a year after The 74th Annual Hunger Games, where Clove took the place as Victor and left her district partner, Cane, to die. She had no regrets about that part; Cane was a 6"2 lump of brick who bullied anyone who came near him. He would have done the same thing to her if it weren't for the mutts. But she still had nightmares about the Jabber jays using her mother's voice to scream in pain and her brother's to call her name in panic. Nightmares about the close call she had with the careers, stumbling through the woods as fast as she could with arrows flying after her. Nightmares about the horrific tracker jackers and their nasty stings, which she still had bruises from. She would wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, sheets tangled around her body and limbs bloody from frantic scratching. Eventually her mother called a therapist who was suppose to help rid her of the nightmares that flashed behind her lids every time they closed. Today was their first session, so Clove had been forced to look "decent". She brushed her dark hair and tied a green ribbon through it that matched her eyes. Throwing on a plain black tank top and shorts, she ran down the stairs of their home in Victor's village to meet her therapist.

The first thing Cato noticed when he stepped into the Sevina's home was their cat. It had black fur and green eyes to match the girl who's lap it was sitting on. A woman who must have been the girl's mother stepped in the room and greeted him, drying her hands on a dishrag. She leaned down to the girl and said "Clove, this is Cato, your therapist," into her ear. So that was her name. Clove. He smiled at her and gave a tentative wave. She returned neither. "He knows what you're going through, remember?" She went on. "He was the victor of the 70th Hunger Games."

That caught Clove's attention. She hadn't known her therapist had suffered through the Games too. Cato didn't look like someone who had; He was dressed in a brown sweater with loose skinny jeans and highly un-professional Chuck Taylor's. He was lacking the dark circles under his eyes that most Victors came with. A splatter of light freckles dusted the bridge of his nose, with golden-blonde hair to match. His light grey eyes were friendly, open. He couldn't have been more than a year older than herself. "Well, I'll leave you too alone now," Her mother said, standing up. She smiled reassuringly at her one last time before she left, closing the door behind her.

Clove watched as Cato set a timer on the coffee table and turned it to thirty minutes. He sat back in a chair across from her, drumming his fingers on the arms of it. There was a long silence while Clove watched the clock tick down the numbers. 30. 26. 22. 15. 11. Cato finally broke it by saying "Have you had the nightmares yet?" She looked up and nodded slowly, stroking the cat on her lap for comfort. "Hallucinations?"

"People have hallucinations about them?" She asked.

"I did," He said, his gaze unwavering. "I couldn't go out for weeks."

Clove shook her head. "I haven't," She said. It came out barely more than a whisper. "Not yet."

"You need a distraction." He said, folding his hands over his knees. "Something to keep you busy, to take up your thoughts."

"I've already tried that," She said.

"Try it again. Painting, reading, friends, anything." He glanced at the timer. "What are you good at?" She thought about it for a moment. Finger painting was about as good as she got with acrylics, and she didn't own a single book. Friends were unlikely.

"Nothing," She said finally, just as the timer went off.

A week passed by and Clove decided that she didn't like Cato all that much. He made her feel crazy by asking questions like "How do you feel?" and intensified her nightmares by recounting some of his own. She wasn't sure he was helping her at all when, "Clove," He said, jerking her back into reality. She looked up.

"I want you to tell me what happens in your nightmares." He said, turning to look at her on the couch they were sharing. Clove shook her head.

"No." She said. "Saying them out loud will only make it worse."

The corners of his mouth turned up a little. "That's what I thought too. But it doesn't. It makes you realize that they're just dreams, the Games are over and you'll never have to do them again." He turned his body so that they were facing each other, both sitting Indian style. Clove thought about it for a moment. Her nightmares couldn't get any worse, and at this point she was getting desperate. She took a deep breath and started.

"Mutts. The mutts are always chasing me, pieces of skin caught in their teeth and covered in blood," She said, her voice shaky. "Then it sounds like everyone I love is getting murdered, tortured, and there's no way to help them. I just keep running from the mutts, and every second they're getting closer, snapping their fangs and barking horribly." Her eyes stung with hot tears. She was trying to hold them back, taking deep breaths, but it wasn't working. "And then the Tracker Jackers come and take away my ability to see straight, and I'm left alone stumbling through the woods with those blood-thirsty mutts on my heels and the sound of my family getting massacred." Her vision blurred as tears splashed down onto her cheeks. Cato shifted a little uncomfortably, moving closer to her and she leaned into his chest. She remembered there being muscles hidden under that sweater as his strong arms wrapped around her. She kept sobbing into him as he stroked her hair gently and pulled her closer. He smelled pleasantly of rain and parchment. Somewhere in the background she heard the timer ding, but Cato didn't leave. He sat there, holding her until she couldn't keep her eyes open any longer. She murmured "Sorry," and the last thing she heard was his soft chuckle in reply.

**What'd you think? Good? Bad? Leave a comment! I'll write more as soon as I get a chance. :D**


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